By Richard Franki
MDedge News
The 20 most frequent surgeries in 2014 represented almost 55% of the 14.2 million operating room procedures performed during inpatient stays in the United States, according to the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ).
Spinal fusion was sixth, with a rate of 145 per 100,000. Six of the top 20 inpatient procedures were musculoskeletal – specifically, knee and hip replacement, spinal fusion, treatment of hip and femur fracture or dislocation (ranked 10th), treatment of other lower-extremity fracture or dislocation (16th), and lower-extremity amputation (18th) – and constituted 16.6% of all operating room procedures in 2014, the AHRQ researchers noted.